WorldWide Drilling Resource

Two for One by Peter Tavino Litchfield Geothermal Geothermal drilling contractors have a new service to offer homeowners who are retrofitting their houses by drilling new boreholes and trenching them to the foundation. Drill crews can easily add a new treatment system for disposing the backwash from water softener systems. Many of these backwash systems flow into the concrete septic tank, where the salt and other chem- icals can deteriorate the tank. New home systems are not allowed to backwash into septic systems, but older ones that do, find an alternative installation to be very costly, unless they are drilling new boreholes for geothermal heating and cooling. Because an excavator will be on-site anyway to dig the connecting trench for the high-density polyethylene pipe supply and return to the drilled and grouted bore- hole(s), the extra excavator cost is minimal to install a new backwash acceptance system away from the concrete tank septic system. We recently cored into the concrete foundation from a drilled borehole as usual with our ground-loop piping inside link seals for pressure testing. We added a third core, three feet above them, to allow the ¾-inch water softener discharge to switch from the wastewater plumbing system to a new discharge pipe in the geothermal trench, which we were digging anyway. From there, we installed a plastic junction box outside, and gravity fed the back- wash into a four-inch PVC pipe, which led to new plastic infiltrator chambers. The sodium chloride or potassium chloride backwash now avoids the septic system and properly leaches out into the soil surrounding the plastic infiltrators. Because this mini pollution source will not affect the sealed and grouted bore- hole, there is no separation distance required. Ours was about 20 feet away. There is a state requirement for the seepage to be at least 75 feet from the potable drinking well, and we did meet this separation dis- tance with no additional digging required. While excavating the trench, we con- firmed it would be 12 inches above seasonal high groundwater. The four-inch PVC pipe, buried about a foot deep, was at least three feet above the geothermal loop piping below it. There was a minimal new seeding and hay area just for the 25-foot by 3-foot area of the infiltrators, located adjacent to and downgradient from the borehole trench. We sized the volume of the four infiltrators at 47-gallon capacity each, to be 188 gallons, exceeding by 150% the daily dis- charge of 116 gallons per day from three treat- ment systems in the basement: one for the dolomite tank, one for the greensand tank, and one for the conventional saltwater container. Our state of Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection pub- lished new regulations for these systems in 2014, which can be searched under "Low Flow Water Treatment Wastewater". These commonsense regulations can be a guideline for states which may not have regulated yet. The only filing requirement to the Health Department permitting the drilling is an As-Built Plan that can be incorporated into the As-Built of the Borehole(s) Plan. Besides the borehole location, we also located the "Low Flow Water Treatment Wastewater Dispersal Structure" as shown in the photo. While we tout sustainable, efficient heating and cooling, we also tout almost free installation cost of a separate treatment system which saves folks' septic tanks. What great fellows you geothermal drilling professionals can be! The statements and comments in this article are based on information and references believed to be true and factual. If you have any questions or comments, please forward them to me in care of WWDR . Pete Peter may be contacted via e-mail to michele@worldwidedrillingresource.com &% ! "" * "(%$ ))) (" $( ' & $ %# # " (" $( $ ( " !" !! ! &% ! % ! (" $( & $ $ $ " ! $ $ ! ! $ ! $ # $ $ $ 14 AUGUST 2016 WorldWide Drilling Resource ®